Product development process capture and display using Web-based technologies

Presents a distributed knowledge capture method used for modeling the product development process. A Web-based solution is proposed to enable rapid collection, continuous update and structured display of organizational and task interactions in large projects. Modeling the product development process in large projects is a complex exercise requiring numerous participants and the coordination and clarification of a considerable amount of collected information. Currently, this is performed through group meetings, where participants attempt to integrate their fragmented knowledge of the overall development process. Web technology is used in the proposed approach to address the limitations of present process modeling practices. The paper presents the design and functionality of a Web-based prototype system. The system is equipped with 'push' data capture and online multi-user issues resolution capabilities. It has been developed on the Windows NT platform using Java, Active Server Pages (ASP), MS SQL-Server RDBMS and JDBC middleware. The prototype system utilizes a multitiered design structure matrix (DSM) configuration to present collected data. The paper also provides sufficient background on DSM-based modeling and its current applications.